


Vouloir, c’est Pouvoir

by alientongue



Category: Vampire: The Masquerade – Bloodlines (Video Game)
Genre: Character Study, Dysfunctional Friendship, Gen, Graphic Description of Injuries, Unresolved Emotional Tension, takes place during an anarch ending
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-01
Updated: 2020-10-01
Packaged: 2021-03-08 01:35:31
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,151
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26757376
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/alientongue/pseuds/alientongue
Summary: Very little possesses as much immediate significance as a truly gigantic bat crashing through the broad central window of his office.LaCroix lacks the remaining energy to startle, but he flinches, twisting his head in a messy and excruciating arc towards the commotion; his Sheriff in animalism shell hits the floor with athudof flesh and a chorusingcrackof many thin, fragile bones. He’s breathing, albeit shallowly and erratically, eyelids drooping over the glance he aims at LaCroix.“So he hadn’t fully killed you.” The key continues to support his weight, which is convenient, because his knees don’t have the strength to maintain purchase in a steadily-deepening puddle of vitae.The Sheriff survives his battle with the fledgling, if just barely, and LaCroix gets what he wished for.
Relationships: Sebastian LaCroix & Sheriff
Comments: 4
Kudos: 12





	Vouloir, c’est Pouvoir

It’s here. After all the indignity, after all the suffering, it’s finally in his hands and in a moment this will all be _over._

Prince Sebastian LaCroix can barely hold himself upright against the sarcophagus. The fledgling, his damnable salvation—between his throat, nape, and spine, they’ve severed something important, whatever it was that let his limbs support his weight. That’s alright. Now that he’s managed to hoist the key up, it bears his weight well enough; standing on his own two feet is out of the question, but with agonizing effort he braces first one knee, then the other, against the tile floor of his office.

Vitae pours in thick sheets from his slit throat down the curve of the sarcophagus. Careful, now. Can’t let it slicken the lid enough he loses grip of the key. Though his head all but lolls now, he forces it to loll at a different angle, and it hurts. It _hurts_. There’s no point plastering on more lies now, not to himself, it hurts like he hasn’t felt since his mortal years. 

_Pinch your arm,_ another member of his platoon had told him as he’d stifled a sob behind gritted teeth, the bullet burning in his side the way a star burns pinprick-bright embedded in the night sky. _As hard as you can. Draw blood if you need to._ They hadn’t seemed to notice the way his eyes welled and hand trembled, but they had noticed, hadn’t they? Only hidden it out of pity. _As much as it takes to have a pain you can control instead._

Viscous heat soaking into the knees of his suit pants, he attempts to chortle and doesn’t bother to register the noise that burbles from his throat instead. What’s gotten into him, to be reminiscing like this? That platoon member, he doesn’t remember their face anymore. He doesn’t remember their name. Neither could hold under the weight of two centuries, and that’s nobody else’s fault. 

The weight of centuries or millennia can be born only by important people who have done important things. What precious little had they done? Survive one battle more than their fellow private? He doesn’t even remember how they died, whenever it was. 

Maybe the grooves of the key pinch his finger as he heaves it inch by inch towards the lock. He has more important things on his mind.

Very little, however, possesses as much immediate significance as a truly gigantic bat crashing through the broad central window of his office.

LaCroix lacks the remaining energy to startle, but he flinches, twisting his head in a messy and excruciating arc towards the commotion; his Sheriff in protean shell hits the floor with a _thud_ of flesh and a chorusing _crack_ of many thin, fragile bones. He’s breathing, albeit shallowly and erratically, eyelids drooping over the glance he aims at LaCroix.

“So he hadn’t fully killed you.” The key continues to support his weight, which is convenient, because his knees don’t have the strength to maintain purchase in a steadily-deepening puddle of vitae. Why he makes that overwhelmingly obvious observation aloud rather than sliding said key fully into place eludes him, but some quiet urge tugs his eyes back to his Sheriff’s whenever they stray again to the sarcophagus.

The broken mass of fur and flesh that is the Sheriff shifts, makes a high, thin noise, and crawls forward on clawed wingtips until he lies just shy of the sarcophagus before LaCroix. Not once does he break eye contact, save for the moment he comes to rest again and shudders, eyes slipping shut.

Suddenly, inexplicably afraid, LaCroix coughs loudly and deliberately. This spatters the floor with a considerable and disgusting amount of mucus-laced vitae, and he’d be profoundly appalled by himself if it weren’t what makes the Sheriff wrinkle his nose, opening his eyes just enough to squint. “You’re just in time, my friend.” For once, it’s an ungainly word on his tongue. “I’ve claimed victory after all.”

His Sheriff clicks, then lows, inhuman noises LaCroix can’t begin to decipher. They ring in his ears anyway. “Yes...yes, I know. The paperwork will be horrific.” But never mind that. Never mind the horrendous Masquerade violation that is a gigantic bat soaring over the Los Angeles skyline; never mind the Anarchs laying claim to the city below. It will be fine. Once he opens the Ankaran Sarcophagus, it will all be fine. 

“But spare a moment—” He wheezes without meaning to. Coughing did not set a good precedent.“—spare a moment for celebration.”

A huff from chiropteran lungs. His Sheriff, as usual, is not the exuberant type, and LaCroix cannot begin to fathom why that thought sends ripples through his chest like a single drop of warmth into icewater. Is it that he’s never seen his Sheriff like this before? The complete powerlessness of his bestial, dying form—it feels wrong, soft and sick-sweet as rotting fruit.

What has his Sheriff done?

The fear from before surges back, beating against LaCroix’s ribs in time for him to finally tear his eyes away, pinning them with wild conviction on the sarcophagus lock. “Fine, then,” he rasps, and with all the power left in his shoulders shoves the key forwards, downwards.

Issuing a quiet scraping noise, the Ankaran Sarcophagus opens. LaCroix’s eyes sting and hands shake, his throat prickling even through the pain. Finally, finally, finally—

 _0:09,_ the timer wired to brick after brick of C4 nestled in the sarcophagus’ corners reads. _0:08,_ it reads an instant later. 

There is no antediluvian. There is no Gehenna. There is a note, scribbled on a piece of notebook paper, that helpfully offers: _BOOM :) Love, Jack_.

No sooner has LaCroix started to choke on his frantic laughter than the Sheriff lunges, as fast as LaCroix’s ever seen him, wounded or not. The timer continues to count down. His knees give out and send him slipping comically to the floor, nose hitting the tile. His vision is red-gold, dark, blurring, spinning. One of the Sheriff’s massive wings wedges under him, smeared with vitae.

Then there is a single deafening, numbing wingbeat, and LaCroix is hurtling through the air, out the broken office window as in the distance his Sheriff’s wing drops limply to his office’s plush, bloodstained ornamental rug.

And his office explodes.

The heat and light of it is immense. Weightless, wind screaming in his ears, LaCroix stares uncomprehending into the bright orange flame blossoming where the topmost floor of Venture Tower used to be. At this distance—at the apex of the arc his Sheriff’s final motion has propelled him—for a single moment it feels like sunlight.

The apex passes. The blossom burns, licking hungrily at the dark of the night sky. Smoke drifts upwards, upwards, until it’s indistinguishable from the clouds.

And whether bought a few more centuries or a few more instants, LaCroix falls.

**Author's Note:**

> i wrote this in like three hours when i couldn't sleep. whoops


End file.
